WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Purdue basketball experienced an offseason workload unlike any other team in the country.

Representing Team USA during the World University Games in Taipei afforded the Boilermakers hundreds of hours of competitive basketball they otherwise would not have had.

In the short term, and perhaps the long, that meant sharpened skills and improved court performance. But what will that extra wear and tear mean in the thick of the Big Ten Conference season?

"September is definitely different," senior guard Dakota Mathias said last week. "We had preseason all summer. We played a third of our schedule this summer, 10-11 games.

"Right now your'e trying to get your legs back, acclimate, work on some stuff."

As much as Purdue coveted a gold medal in Taipei, coach Matt Painter kept a long view intact. "We want to be really good in February and March and tried to work toward that," Painter said earlier this summer.

That meant a departure from the usual summer structure. In previous years, associate director of strength & conditioning Josh Bonhotal used those months to coax significant physical gains from the athletes. NCAA rules limit teams to two hours of practice per week. That freed up time spent in the weight room.

This summer those restrictions were lifted to allow the Boilermakers to prepare for the World University Games.

"The benefit we're getting from the extra basketball, that obviously takes precedent," Bonhotal said. "It is invaluable for us. All work they're doing in training and with me is to prepare them to go out and play basketball — to be able to put more practice time in at a high level."

During a season, Bonhotal monitors the players' physical wellness through a variety of tools. That oversight typically relaxes in the summer. Soreness and routine bumps and bruises aren't as critical with no game to play the next day.

This summer, however, Bonhotal had players wearing GPS monitors and force plate sensors at every practice for biomechanical analysis. Players also regularly filled out wellness questionnaires to track their sleep, soreness level and other factors.

Bonhotal considers such communication a crucial part of an otherwise high-tech process.

"I have conversations on a daily basis with every single one of our guys, feeling out where they're at, how they're responding to practices and games, those sorts of things," Bonhotal said. "You're constantly adapting a plan for each individual guy."

Bonhotal held team workouts four or five days a week in past summers. This year he usually only had them for three days. To compansate, Bonhotal said he tried to push the players harder during those less-frequent sessions.

He wanted the players to mentally adjust to playing through feeling sore or tired. They needed that mindset to play eight games in 10 days in Taipei. They'll need it again in the coming college season.

"We take care of our bodies extremely well as a team," freshman guard Nojel Eastern said. "They give us a proper amount of days off so we can rest. It's not like we go every day. When we go we go hard, but then they give us some time to rest our bodies, get mentally better."

Despite the altered training approach this summer, Bonhotal said he still saw physical progress throughout the roster. Eastern and fellow freshman Aaron Wheeler have both added about 10 pounds since arriving on campus. Others experienced gains in their jumping ability and speed.

Bonhotal also singled out Mathias as someone who stayed on campus for Maymester and put in extra work prior to the summer. That was an extension of the work that helped turn Mathias into an all-Big Ten defender last season.

Purdue didn't need to worry as much about conditioning as it happened naturally throughout a summer of practices and intrasquad scrimmages.

The Boilermakers are currently participating in individual drills. When preseason practices officially begin again on Sept. 29, they'll have a better grasp of how their atypical summer affected them physically.

"Overall I thought it was a very successful offseason in terms of maximizing the basketball piece and extra practice time while still being able make some performance gains and see physical improvements with guys," Bonhotal said. "It can be a very difficult thing to do, trying to do two things at once."